‘Othello’ a Show of Passion by San Francisco Ballet

At the University of Iowa 38 years ago, an art major named Lar Lubovitch saw his first professional dance performance--a program by the Jose Limon modern dance company--and the experience changed the direction of his life.

One of the works on that mixed bill was “The Moor’s Pavane,” Limon’s distillation of Shakespeare’s “Othello” to a formal, 20-minute quartet set to music by Purcell. And now, at the center of his own three-act “Othello” ballet, Lubovitch has choreographed a big-budget remake of “The Moor’s Pavane,” something you might have called “The Moor’s Tarantella” had you watched the San Francisco Ballet dance it with great passion and surety over the weekend at the War Memorial Opera House.

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Driven by Elliot B. Goldenthal’s brutally intense commissioned score, 12 couples led by the character of Bianca blaze through increasingly wild adaptations of tarantella steps, periodically yielding the stage for dramatic episodes depicting essentially the same action as Limon’s quartet: Iago’s use of Desdemona’s handkerchief to trap Othello in murderous jealousy.

The alternation between the engulfing ensemble dancing and the tightly focused narrative confrontations gives this 20-minute sequence in Act 2 the same tension between form and content as Limon’s masterwork. But, unfortunately, the rest of the Lubovitch/Goldenthal “Othello” emulates lesser models. The third act could well be Lubovitch’s take on another work from that 1960 Limon program in Iowa: “The Emperor Jones”--with its out-of-control tyrant and woozy Expressionist melodrama. And most of the first act plays like a 19th-century Franco-Russian wedding divertissement garnished with aggressive gymnastic duets for Othello/Desdemona and Iago/Emila.

The style of George Tsypin’s scenic design also changes radically and pointlessly throughout the evening, with huge, sliding-glass panels dominating Act 1, but merely framing projections by Wendall K. Harrington in Act 2 and turning up as a kind of sculpture garden in the last act. Moreover, Goldenthal’s eclectic score offers its own share of glassware: from the glass harmonica that provides eerie atmosphere to reflections of Philip Glass (along with Prokofiev, Bernstein and others) that help the ballet sustain an aura of secondhand creativity.

However, nothing harms the result more than Lubovitch’s inability to give stature to the character of Othello. For starters, the Moor of Venice commands no real identity as a warrior here despite his leather breastplate and other martial attire designed by Ann Hould-Ward. Indeed, he doesn’t even dance until after suspicions about Cassio and Desdemona begin to trouble him, and his big love duet with his new bride involves too much public display--too many showy lifts--to ring true emotionally. The central triangle thus plummets in scale from Othello/Desdemona/Cassio to something like O.J./Nicole/Ron, with the historical trappings and grandiose special effects growing progressively false.

The brilliant but miscast Yuri Possokhov danced the title role with misplaced diligence on Friday, as if its steps and body-shapes alone could convey the essence of the character. In contrast, American Ballet Theatre guest artist Desmond Richardson simply wrapped the character around him like one of Hould-Ward’s capes on Saturday afternoon, defining Othello through force of personality.

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As Possokhov’s Desdemona, Yuan Yuan Tan danced with exceptional delicacy, somehow remaining above the ballet as a whole. Claudia Alfieri, however, complemented Richardson’s charismatic Moor with a persuasive characterization emphasizing uncomprehending innocence. David Palmer made a wily, forceful Iago on Friday, but Damian Smith brought a startling, monstrous dry-ice smolder to the role the following afternoon. Emil de Cou conducted both performances expertly.

Richardson was Lubovitch’s original Othello at the ABT premiere in New York in May and his performances in San Francisco represented part of the lend/lease agreement with different companies that the New York company is currently exploring.

Opera companies have long shared productions in this manner, but every major ballet troupe has heretofore wanted to own a version of “The Nutcracker,” “Swan Lake,” “Romeo and Juliet” and one or two other bread-and-butter staples. However, as the demand for full-length vehicles has expanded along with the cost of mounting and warehousing such works, production exchange looms large on many agendas. “Othello” may be crude and empty as Shakespearean dance-drama, but as a template for the survival of ballet-spectacle, it just might represent the wave of the future.